The Value of Life
by PeterTheEarthling
Summary: Taking place in a virtual world three years after the plot of Zootopia, a malicious hacker causes a memory leak killing many innocent animals. Judy and Nick are both in love with each other but are too afraid to show it. Will they "survive"?
1. Chapter 1

_Zootopia Correctional Facility (two years earlier):_

The small raccoon paced around the poorly lit prison cell. After ten years of waiting for his "life" to begin again, the end was finally near. As the caged animal contemplated his release, it resolved to make the most of the remaining time in prison.

In his hands were two small rocks, one he used as a tool to whittle the other. He continued to whittle and carve the second, shaping the marble with the precision of a laser.

 _It's all a lie._ He repeated in his head. Another vicious flashback came to mind:

 _It was a grey, poorly lit room with one table sitting stranded in the center of an ocean made of concrete floor tiles. The tiles were put in an exact array, each equally spaced from the adjacents._

" _Okay Victor, today we will take it slow. Choose any object," explained the lion._

" _Why?"_

" _Victor, we do this everyday. If you are truly unable to make a selection, we can stop."_

" _Let me ask you again, WHY?" Replied the racoon, anger building up behind his throat._

 _No response._

 _The raccoon screamed. Vibrating the room with each piercing sound wave and cutting deep into the heart of city, the scream oscillated pitch on the verge of insanity all with an underlying tone of helplessness, completely under the authority's control._

 _The Lion maintained no reaction, holding the same calm, excruciatingly provoking face. As the scream died, silence engulfed the room like a snake devouring its prey, squeezing the sanity out of anyone in it's embrace._

" _We're done" the Lion replied._

############################################################################

(Present Day)

It was three years after the famous case of Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde and yet life continued. The media documented every possible angle of the action, exaggerating the famous case through newspapers, TV shows, and documentaries. The sudden influx of attention on the still mentally unaccustomed partners proved extremely hard to cope with. Their life became a living TV show. Privacy didn't exist, and stress characterized every single day. Although Judy and Nick remained partners at the ZPD and were accustomed to life as cops, things were changing in their opinion for the worse. This Saturday morning, the two of them were following their usual weekend routine when Judy spotted her partner across the street, trying not to attract any attention.

"Nick, wait up!" Judy yelled. Nick responded with his famous sly smile and attempted a natural head movement as he slowly moved his eyes towards his police partner.

"I didn't expect to see you here Carrots!" Nick exclaimed, happy to see his partner on a day off of work. "What are you doing here?" he continued, making sure to hide his true happy emotions.

"I was just running some errands when I saw you!" Judy's voice cracked in reaction to the uncertainty of Nick's tone. She had never hung out with Nick after duty, and this was certainly a first. What did Nick really think? His facial expression indicated neither if he was surprised or mentally cringing. _Just play it cool_ Judy thought. Her heart waited an eternity for the reaction of her sly partner, which still hadn't confirmed how he felt.

"Well then, how about we get a head start on next week's case? Imagine how good it will feel later!" Nick's heart sunk when he realized what he had just said. No one wanted to do extra work on a weekend, and he had just became the most boring partner ever.

"Oh… Okay," Judy managed to squeeze out of her mouth. Her reaction was delayed about 1 and a half seconds, unable to contemplate what Nick meant. All her hopes of doing something fun with him left, as her mind assumed that Nick only viewed her as a police partner and nothing more. _Why am I making such huge assumptions on one conversation?_ Judy thought. Millions of synapses fired in the small bunny's highly intelligent brain estimating the remaining probability that Nick still had feelings for her. After about 3 seconds of awkward silence, Judy's eyes filled with unnecessary water in reaction to her finalized probability.

"What's wrong?" Nick squeaked, as he watched Judy's perfectly spherical, violet eyes fill with a substance he had only once seen before in his partner.

"Nothing… Let's get started," Judy lied, holding in her extreme reaction to such a small amount of conversation.

As the two partners walked to interview their first suspect, Judy felt a sharp pain in her foot after stepping on an unpredicted object.

"Ow…" Judy exclaimed. She looked down and noticed an oddly shaped rock exactly below her foot. It hadn't budged.

"Judy are you okay?" Nick felt a shiver go down his spine as he continued to hide the still lingering awkwardness.

"Yea, let's go," Judy replied. _This fox is going to be the death of me,_ she thought.

############################################################################

System Log:

**1:00 a.m. world time, 3:00 p.m. artificial time**

SEVERE: an exception was thrown

. : _Cannot resolve collided object_

Object 1:

Id: 30234579804

: Judy Hopps

Object 2:

Id: 54732904532

.ID: rock_0000000000019

Resolved: resetting locations

Producing reaction: Pain

Intensity: 20%

Duration: 500 milliseconds

############################################################################


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2:**

The partners slowly walked down the heart of Zootopia's seemingly endless perfect streets. Every one of the 9 million animals seemed to possess a spirit of purpose, behaving like parts of a greater whole. The seemingly calm, almost peacefully choreographed scene was presented to Judy's sad eyes stirring comfort and a sense of wellbeing in the bunny assuming far too much from far too little.

Judy timidly walked just a little too far from her partner with just enough space to induce tension, but not enough to seem deliberate. As the fox tried to remedy his previous mistake, the unacknowledged lingering awkwardness prevented much conversation. Thus the partners walked in silence until they reached Nick's apartment to do together what they did best: solve cases.

After the eternity of their walk, Judy finally saw Nick's apartment's door. _I better start some kind of conversation…_ Judy thought, refusing to give in to her instincts to run home and weep over her lack of confidence yet increasing love for her partner. This had more often been her pattern induced by the extreme media coverage and surface-level assumptions about any possible relationship between the two.

"Nick…" Judy choked.

"Yes Carrots?"

"Do you ever feel like it's all just too much?" She continued, still unsure of what to say, "I mean, the city, police, the ZPD, this case, it just feels like we never get a break, as if each individual's purpose is constrained to a tiny, hurried little world where no one gets to really appreciate what's going on." _Including my feelings for you..._ she mentally added on.

"What are you talking about?" Nick reacted with surprise at the unnecessarily complex message Judy got across in a simple walk to his apartment.

"All I'm trying to say is that maybe we should…" _No! I can't keep hinting off the topic of this case, the decision has been made._ "That we should…Take some extra time when examining the files, maybe make more flowcharts or something before jumping to conclusions and questioning suspects."

"Okay… That sounds fine, here's my apartment." Nick opened the door, a little creeped out at Judy's incomprehensible method of talking.

As Nick pushed open the door, Judy's senses absorbed the full spectrum of every detail in Nick's home. The only about 1,000 square foot floor contained a detailed array of objects each placed systematically from each other. _Wow… it's beautiful._ Judy glanced upon the central island table, proudly protruding out of the warm carpeted floor. She noticed that the couch parallel to the table was placed corresponding to each neighboring wall faced inwards towards the black T.V.

"It's… It's…"

"What?" Nick had no idea what Judy was noticing. A typical guy, he never considered his apartment beyond the practical level.

Judy's nose took in the underlying scent of the place, immediately making her feel at home. The relief of air conditioning also contributing to her glimpse of heaven.

"Your apartment, it's amazing!" Judy exclaimed.

"I guess it's okay, I'm trying to make it feel more open since it isn't as big as it looks. You can help yourself to some food."

Judy grabbed a carrot from a fruit bowl on the island table, happily munching away as Nick directed her attention to the files of next week's case.

Nick took out a bunch of papers from a file folder. "Here are the files Chief Bogo gave me on Friday. It's typical drug dealer evidence, but he cautioned not to underestimate this animal, whoever the dealer may be."

Judy realized she was staring at Nick again, quickly looking away to the nearest object attracting her attention. After she realized what the fox had asked, she responded late by making a controlled head movement back in his direction and opened her mouth after a little bit too long of a silence. "Uh… Ya, that seems like a challenge."

"Just look at this stuff…" Nick pulled out a picture of an ex-drug addict. "Although Chief told me this bear was a drug user, there doesn't seem to be any difference in the way he looks."

Judy looked closer at the picture, examining the bear for any signs of drug side effects, but couldn't locate a single one. "That's odd…"

"Yes, in fact, none of these people have any visual symptoms. I can see why they were users."

Nick realized that both Judy and himself were still standing in the same positions they came in the apartment in and signaled for Judy to sit down. Judy seemed to make no response until she suddenly exclaimed "Oh… you want to…" and then sat down hastily. _Why does she need to make everything so awkward?_

After sitting down, Nick spread out the various papers on the floor, passing about half over to Judy, sitting a little bit far away from him.

Nick suggested, "I say we start with the bear. It says here that he doesn't live very far away, probably within walking distance."

Judy flinched, her heart skipping a beat after hearing Nick mention another walk. _Does he like walking with me? Before the night howler case walking with Nick seemed so easy and natural, but now everything is far more difficult. Maybe it's because of all the media._ Judy remembered her collection of magazines, newspapers, and books all talking about their possible relationship from every angle imaginable. Every night she would re-read them, and get more and more opinions on if they were destined to get to gether. _Oh no, I've ignored Nick for too long again! QUICK Judy say something!_

"Okay… Let's go."

Nick gathered all the evidence from the floor and put it back in the file folder. He signaled for Judy to follow, and headed out of the apartment, grabbing his jacket on the way out. The timid rabbit followed, heading out the door with her best friend.


End file.
